Bottom of the Bottle
by ncfan
Summary: She did try, from time to time.


Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

* * *

"Are you drinking on the job _again?_"

Tsunade looked up at Shizune, not with the guilt of someone who's been caught red handed, but with the cool calm of someone who wasn't going to stop just because she had been caught. "Yes."

Shizune folded her arms, gentling shooing Ton-ton out of the office for the moment while she talked to Tsunade. Her brow furrowed as she moved back towards the desk. "I thought you said you were going to stop," she said sadly.

"I did," Tsunade replied, trying to sound unconcerned.

"How long did this last?"

"About three days."

Shizune sighed. "I was afraid of that."

In truth, Tsunade had been trying to stop drinking. It wasn't the first time, though the way Tsunade's head started to hurt after several days without alcohol was not enjoyable and she was beginning to question whether trying to stop drinking was worth it. It was difficult, beyond difficult, it was near-impossible.

"Where did you even get sake, anyway?" Shizune asked, confused. "I asked all the vendors in town I know not to sell it to you."

Tsunade's face tightened a little. "Yes, I figured that out after the first _twenty_ times they made me look like an idiot by refusing to sell to me." This time, it was Shizune who was shooting a completely unapologetic look at Tsunade. "I have an old friend who distills sake out of his basement. He gave it to me."

Shizune rolled her eyes. "Well, it's not like private distilling is _illegal_—" she shot a meaningful look at her mistress "—or anything in Konoha, and no, I'm not going to ask where your friend lives." Shizune tilted her head, and her face turned half-stern, half-sympathetic; she had occasionally been tempted to mimic her mistress' drinking habits. "But you know as well as I do: this has to stop."

"Or my whole body is going to shut down, I know, I know," Tsunade waved her manicured hand, and all the while the muscles in her face shifted uncomfortably. "I really do know," she said more quietly.

Shizune sat down on the desk, placing her clipboard and stack of files on another clear area. "Well, the biggest question is, do you really want to stop drinking or not?"

Tsunade rubbed her forehead, looking distastefully at the ever heightening stack of paperwork on her mahogany desk. "I don't know. I say I do, but then the paperwork and the council start butting in and the withdrawal is complete and utter hell…"

"You can take painkillers for the withdrawal symptoms, you know," Shizune supplied, folding her hands across her lap.

The Godaime Hokage curled her lip. "And turn into a walking vegetable for twelve hours at a time? Thank you, no. I don't know if there's anything else I can do."

"You didn't answer my question," Shizune told her softly. "Do you want to stop drinking or not?"

Tsunade looked at her for a long time, then drew in a deep breath. "Yes."

Shizune let out a deep breath. "Okay. Let's think. You've tried before. What was the longest amount of time that you managed to stop drinking?"

Tsunade knew that one quite well. "Six weeks. It was ten years ago. You gave me the liver talk." She grimaced; the liver talk was a particularly vivid memory of Tsunade's.

A sharp, angry swish of black linen reflected the way Shizune felt about that incident. "I remember too," she said tightly. "It was after you fell into an alcoholic coma." She started to get a little off-track. "Do you know how badly you scared me? The worst nightmare of my life for three years after that was that it would happen again and you wouldn't wake up. Thank God Jiraiya-sama was in the same town as us and was able to help me get you to a hospital—"

"Shizune!" Tsunade quickly drew her back into reality with a sharp snap. She softened her voice when she saw Shizune jump and flinch. "The liver talk."

Shizune frowned. "Did it really startle you that much?"

Tsunade laughed harshly. "A ten-minute infomercial, completely deadpan, informing me in excruciatingly graphic detail what alcohol was doing to my liver, all out of the mouth of a fourteen-year-old? It _terrified _me." Just as much as Jiraiya laughing after seeing her reaction to Shizune's informative "talk" had irritated her enough to find the strength to lean up from her hospital bed and swipe him upside the head. The way her whole body had ached afterwards had been entirely worth it.

"Six weeks," Shizune mused. "A record."

Tsunade nodded, smiling slightly. "I want to hear it again. Do you remember it?"

"Vividly. But do you think it will work?"

Tsunade laughed again. "I don't know. Hey, I'm desperate; I'll try anything."

Shizune smiled, staring out the windows as golden afternoon sunlight poured into the office. "Okay. You're a chronic relapsing-remitting alcoholic—"

"Oh, thank you so much. That makes me feel so much better now."

"—and I don't see how it could hurt." Her face became entirely businesslike. "The human liver, is in its healthy state a soft, pink organ…"

* * *

I always figured that with her medical expertise and knowledge of the human body, Tsunade must have known what alcohol was going to do to her, and she must have tried to stop drinking from time to time. Her biggest problem with that were the emotional problems that I personally think lied behind a lot of the drinking, along with the fact that she was too stubborn to try any method of quitting but cold turkey.


End file.
